Saturday, August 04, 2012

I don't much care for this.

My elder daughter recently got back from high school band camp, up in Oklahoma. She had a great time, and has a lot of stories to tell, and some T-shirts. One of them was supplied by the local high school, just as freebies to the visiting school's band, which was nice, I thought.

I looked at the back, and there seems to be a pretty major lack of separation of church and state:

Keep in mind that the shirts were given to my kid while she was at a school-sponsored trip, and were provided by another school band. My school district and theirs subsidized this.

Not a problem, you say? Would you be as fine with it if it was like this?

Thinking more about this. Matt, I honestly believe that erasing the graphic reference to religion makes as much sense as saying, "We need to erase the graphic reference to family in the lower left corner, because not everybody's family looks like that. In fact, some people don't even have families." That would be ridiculous, wouldn't it?

Erasing all reference to family life, simply because not everyone has the same family structure or because many people do not have families at all, would be intolerant. And it would be equally intolerant to erase all public references to religion, simply because not everyone's religion looks like other people's relgion, or because some people do not have a religion at all.

A free society does not tell entire parts of the population to shut up and pretend they and their lifestyle choices don't really exist. It does not force people to avoid expressing parts of themselves that they consider integral to their core identity. This is true whether we are talking about religion or about sexuality and family structure or about any other aspect of human freedom that might offend (but does not harm!) the neighbors.

The real evil, of course, is in coercing any person to pay for the expression of opinions they themselves do not believe in or support. But the only way to avoid doing that is to abolish the inherently-coercive public school system, and every bit of taxation that goes with it.

As long as the public school system stands, those who support it will continue unavoidably forcing their private views on unwilling others.

Don't erase religion from public life. Erase intolerance, in all its forms.

For all the good that religion has done, I can point to an equal bad that it has brought to someone.

If you choose it for yourself, that's fine. I don't want people choosing it for my kids.

I don't want Muslim kids. I don't want Aum Shinrikyo kids. I don't want Jewish kids. I don't particularly want devout Mormon or Christion kids. I want my children to think for themselves, critically, and to decide how to love.

I won't stand in the way of the religion that my children choose. I send my children to receive Christian education, because they need to know about it, in our environment. What they choose for themselves will be up to them. I will NOT tolerate hate. Frankly, a lot of religion seems to be just fine with intolerance and hate.

I hope I don't offend anyone with these views, but I won't back down on them.

Maybe the students had the shirts made at their expense.Perhaps the shirts were bought by the band boosters, or an alumni group.If they did, I would have a problem with the school restricting the free practice of their religion by telling them that the shirts were unacceptable.